14:8 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 



which rises free of branches, from 60 to 80 feet high, 

 bearing aloft a superb crown of foliage, which over- 

 top the humbler vegetation around. But woe is the 

 traveller, if his skin touches the milky juice which 

 its bark contains in abundance, and which it is ever 

 ready to spurt forth. Blisters and ulcers much more 

 painful and terrible, though not unlike those pro- 

 duced by the poisonous sumac- tree, appear at once. 

 This is the autjar of the Javanese ; the poJion upas 

 (poison tree) of the Malays ; the ypo of the inhabi- 

 tants of Celebes and the Philippines. (Antiaris 

 toxicaria.) The use of this upas poison, a prac- 

 tice which at one time prevailed through nearly all 

 the islands of the South, is giving way to Euro- 

 pean firearms everywhere except in the most re- 

 mote and inaccessible parts of these islands. 



THE VALLEY OF DEATH. 



We cannot conclude this short sketch of poisonous 

 trees, and especially the description of the upas-tree 

 of Java, without saying a word about that valley the 

 deadly character of which is attributed by the igno- 

 rant natives to the exhalations that rise from these 

 terrible trees. Let us here again follow the narrative 

 of Schleiden. 



Leaving the dense virgin forest the traveller ascends 

 a small hill and suddenly there is spread out before him 

 a fearful wilderness, a genuine realm of death. The 

 small level valley shows not a trace of vegetable life ; 

 nothing is seen but the bare soil burnt by the sun's 



